tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-57168932009-12-27T09:36:16.077-06:00Just where I place my rants and raves...John Crosonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01927740573342195129pcnorb@gmail.comBlogger91125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5716893.post-37533233878553067152009-10-01T13:11:00.005-05:002009-10-01T13:57:19.670-05:00

Please don't wait. I'm usually not one to step on a soap-box to promote a product (steps down...) but this is a good one, one which many already know about and use.I used to be a heavy Evolution user. Dunno why I initially made this decision, only that it came installed on my Ubuntu Jaunty install as the default email client with the Gnome UI.I started having some issues with it recently, where

John Crosonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01927740573342195129pcnorb@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5716893.post-59433831719385665252009-09-11T13:27:00.008-05:002009-10-01T13:39:32.437-05:00

Image via WikipediaI recently had the need to provide printer admin access on an ERP server to ordinary users. Nothing makes me shudder more than elevating a users access on a machine that holds your entire business operation on it's drives... I was able to come up with a solution using CPAU.exe which I've written about here. The scenario: An active label printer and a backup. When one goes

John Crosonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01927740573342195129pcnorb@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5716893.post-10153365129934334022009-07-16T19:31:00.004-05:002009-07-16T20:06:17.796-05:00

This afternoon my wife had to work, so dinner was on me.She left me a bag of assorted frozen seafood we bought at Woodman's in Kenosha defrosting in the sink.What to do, what to do...I had a half a vadalia onion left over in the fridge.Image via WikipediaOne yellow bell pepper.One heaping teaspoon of chopped garlic ( from the jar ).One heaping teaspoon of ginger paste.One large tomato.Two heaping

John Crosonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01927740573342195129pcnorb@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5716893.post-89932150103189334272009-07-16T07:42:00.005-05:002009-07-16T08:11:04.979-05:00

Recently I wrote a post about my search for a TIFF iFilter that would enable me to use VBScript to query a Windows Indexing Services server for file management.I found that since OCR is never always 100% accurate, neither were my attempts at sorting all the inbound EMR faxes we get each day.I did however, find Tesseract, a great product that was originally developed by HP and proprietary, and is

John Crosonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01927740573342195129pcnorb@gmail.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5716893.post-36899284711721668052009-07-09T17:14:00.004-05:002009-07-09T17:33:14.209-05:00

My wife, son and I recently took a trip to St Louis, to visit her Mom and Dad. We always have a good time, but don't look forward to the drive, as it takes 7 hours or so one way from 'lil old SE Wisconsin.Image via Wikipedia Thankfully, she looked into an older style of travel for our most recent trip to visit G'ma and G'pa; Amtrak. The cost is not much more than it is to drive. Fuel costs

John Crosonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01927740573342195129pcnorb@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5716893.post-53933287101887414372009-06-21T07:59:00.010-05:002009-06-26T13:17:46.620-05:00

First, I realize this is going to generate some issues for some, since Twitter's use is primarily for micro-blogging, keeping connected with others, but some have been using it for other various reasons. Image via CrunchBaseI think the producing backlinks (which really doesn't work as far as Google is concerned...but I digress) and driving website traffic are two good examples, and these are what

John Crosonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01927740573342195129pcnorb@gmail.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5716893.post-4814566507872767642009-06-18T08:13:00.004-05:002009-06-18T08:41:29.608-05:00

Image via WikipediaLooking for methods to exclude files in our Indexing Service repository, I found some information on the MSDN with sparse descriptions of registry values. Fortunately, Microsoft KB article 322896 provides a direct set if instructions.

John Crosonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01927740573342195129pcnorb@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5716893.post-73511377290539711132009-06-18T07:22:00.006-05:002009-06-18T09:04:53.420-05:00

I recently wrote a VBScript utility that queries the contents of an Indexing Service database, finds the indexed Fax documents (CCITT Group 4 (2d) Tiff's), sorts and moves them to another repository located on a SAN. Option Explicit Dim oCon Dim oCmd Dim oRst Dim sQry Dim sString Dim sScope Dim sAqScan Dim sFile Dim sPath Dim sMoveTo Dim sNum Dim FSO Dim sDate Dim sDosText Dim sDateDir Dim

John Crosonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01927740573342195129pcnorb@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5716893.post-92174205998845971242009-06-08T09:38:00.005-05:002009-06-08T10:28:46.807-05:00

One of my clients required job accounting for an iR C2550 Canon printer. This is how I did it TM.Step One : Set up printers on serverSet up two printers on the server. One will be used for color, the other for B&W. Give them names that differentiate this. On the Security tab of the drivers, ensure that the Manage Printer ACL is not checked. B&W Specific Driver Settings: General Tab, Printing

John Crosonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01927740573342195129pcnorb@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5716893.post-33836742277234308192009-06-03T12:13:00.006-05:002009-06-03T12:31:46.748-05:00

My employer, IHBSOnline.com, uses the Efficon Articles 3.x module in DotNetNuke to aid in driving website traffic. Every morning, I troll the news sites, and add News content items to the module. Then I use Twitter to announce these additions. I can easily browse to the posts and see the number of hits these items generate. Image via CrunchBase I also use the iFinity Google Analytics module to

John Crosonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01927740573342195129pcnorb@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5716893.post-19269986450348619772009-06-03T07:14:00.005-05:002009-12-11T06:35:37.648-06:00

I've always disliked the fact that I couldn't print to our Canon iR C2880 in color. It's not got the postscript option, which had I known how difficult it would have been for non-Windows PC's to use it, I would have investigated that option. They advertise the fact that the folks at Codehost, Inc. make a product called BrightQ that will print to these machines, but I never got it working well on

John Crosonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01927740573342195129pcnorb@gmail.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5716893.post-28797991157744506772009-05-29T16:21:00.003-05:002009-05-29T16:47:09.333-05:00

I've been using GFI Faxmaker since around version 10, but mostly in Exchange environments, and usually trying to get it to work with a variety of analog modems. Image via Wikipedia I have a customer that's moving to a hosted Exchange solution, and we've just moved the last of the users mailboxes off-site. Now came the simple task of pointing the Email2FAXGateway settings to send mail to the

John Crosonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01927740573342195129pcnorb@gmail.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5716893.post-71547726979312723522009-05-27T08:11:00.000-05:002009-06-27T08:19:20.993-05:00

This Bio was written by my employer. I was very flattered... John likes to refer to himself as a “jack of all trades”, but his experience and knowledge of technical and operating systems make him anything but a generalist. John’s background in information systems ranges from development of software, to design and implementation of hardware compatibilities, to key management-related duties, such

John Crosonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01927740573342195129pcnorb@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5716893.post-73079325981404833442009-05-27T07:54:00.001-05:002009-10-29T12:13:02.869-05:00

John Croson 2121 Taylor Avenue • Racine, WI 53403 • 262-637-5882 • john@croson.us 8 years of cross-platform experience in systems administration including analyzing, designing, installing, maintaining, and repairing hardware, software, peripherals and networks. Superior troubleshooting and technical support abilities with migrations, network connectivity, and security and database

John Crosonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01927740573342195129pcnorb@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5716893.post-3416613999864906832009-05-21T07:09:00.004-05:002009-05-21T07:58:30.346-05:00

Image by AFP/Getty Images via DaylifeOut of the box, DotNetNuke provides a method of programatically creating a search-engine friendly XML sitemap for easy website submissions to the likes of Google, Yahoo and others that accept that format. This is one of the first things to do in your quest for SEO. What it doesn't do, is accurately give a priority to pages. A priority is used by webmasters to

John Crosonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01927740573342195129pcnorb@gmail.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5716893.post-39520274389163983082009-04-14T07:54:00.004-05:002009-05-18T07:06:43.476-05:00

Another step towards an SEO site, and providing a user-friendly site map, is to use Derek Trauger's DNN SiteMap Module. It does a fine job. Just have a look here: http://www.ihbsonline.com/Site_Map.aspx.

John Crosonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01927740573342195129pcnorb@gmail.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5716893.post-69820840709629172142009-04-09T07:36:00.015-05:002009-05-18T07:27:32.932-05:00

I've been reading quite a bit lately on improving SEO for our DotNetNuke website, IHBSOnline.com and quickly realized it just isn't enough to throw up a website, add a listing in a couple of search engines and wait for the masses. First off, the DnnFriendlyUrlProvider, while writing friendlier URL's than older versions of DNN, could be better. This is why you need the iFinity FriendlyURL

John Crosonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01927740573342195129pcnorb@gmail.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5716893.post-58529602403569217072009-03-26T06:52:00.006-05:002009-05-18T07:15:26.400-05:00

This post was prompted by a couple of off-line inquiries into my experience with a recent VIPRE Enterprise deployment. I should point out that this is NOT my first deployment of anti-virus software. I've rolled out McAfee, Trend, and Symantec server/client solutions. I was probably found because of my activity on Twitter, since I was whining about it one day... In any case, here's my story.

John Crosonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01927740573342195129pcnorb@gmail.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5716893.post-39789945798625740462009-03-12T08:01:00.002-05:002009-05-18T07:17:26.709-05:00

Customer service these days seems to be lacking, when they should be excelling. I was talking about this topic with a co-worker yesterday over lunch. We both agreed that providers of goods and services need to be even more attentive to their customer base these days, especially in light of the fact that the economy is in such a mess.Image via Wikipedia

John Crosonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01927740573342195129pcnorb@gmail.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5716893.post-24780226609198856402009-02-23T10:29:00.005-06:002009-05-18T07:18:53.218-05:00

NOTE: After a cursory view of the Symantec forums, it's come to my attention that it is NOT best practice to use Rapid Release, unless directed by Symantec or if you have this worm. I would compare this closely to M$ release of patches that are special in nature, and would normally only release these if the system exhibited specific symptoms related to said patch. In other words, use at your own

John Crosonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01927740573342195129pcnorb@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5716893.post-15724669883213096862009-02-06T09:01:00.005-06:002009-05-18T07:21:31.632-05:00

I like scripting. It helps me manage my client PC's, perform redundant tasks, push out software updates, among other things. Most of the users on my network do not have privileges to install software, so this affects how some of my scripts function. I discovered that setting GPO to install applications with elevated privileges doesn't mean that the logon scripts also get processed the same way.

John Crosonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01927740573342195129pcnorb@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5716893.post-52278158337755336142009-01-28T08:40:00.013-06:002009-01-28T13:48:52.708-06:00

A co-worker of mine sent this thread of email, telling me about a prank one brother was pulling on the other. From what I could understand, between the tears of laughter, was that "Dan Smith" was having some issues using a Hickory Farms gift card, given him by his Grandma-ma. He must have contacted Hickory Farms, and was told they would get back to him. His brother learned of this, and decided

John Crosonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01927740573342195129pcnorb@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5716893.post-18273011391678130672009-01-27T20:23:00.006-06:002009-05-18T07:33:30.290-05:00

I love Indian food. My wife does too, I think because she knows it's time for me to have a beer, glass of 12 yo scotch or whatever happens to be in our liquor department that night, and get my "creative juices" going. Tonight, I really made something quite tasty. Chicken in coconut milk, and Potlakaya (snake gourd) w/chick-peas. I saw a recipe for Potlakaya Perugu Pachadi, and it looked pretty

John Crosonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01927740573342195129pcnorb@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5716893.post-53619682799561230192008-12-27T08:41:00.008-06:002009-12-27T09:36:16.089-06:00

My wife and I recently purchased a Panasonic SDR-H40 for capturing video of our son and daughter, after our Canon MiniDV crapped out last year. It was disappointing when the Canon failed again...TWO times this thing decides to get tape debris caught in the heads. This was the most delicate camera ever owned, and captured excellent quality footage, but I will NEVER buy another tape-based machine

John Crosonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01927740573342195129pcnorb@gmail.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5716893.post-18783377459745766582008-12-16T15:52:00.003-06:002009-05-18T07:39:34.454-05:00

As a consultant, I used GFI LANguard (7?...it was at least 2 years ago) as a tool, in conjunction with nmap and some others, to perform security audits for our clients.Now I've an opportunity to use it again, and agreed to give it a review. EnvironmentDell Dimension 5150 P4 3ghz, 2gb Ram SLED 10.1, running VMWare Server 1.x 768mb allocated for XP SP2 Instance LAN, 2003 Domain in mixed mode The

John Crosonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01927740573342195129pcnorb@gmail.com0